I took the rings once belonging to my dead father out of the wooden box where they had been stored for two years and started to feel something again. I held them in my hands, wanting to forever etch them into my being as though somehow that grand gesture would preserve something I had lost.

As the wine passed my lips I wondered what he would say. What he would think. How he was…. the rings grew warm in my clenched fist and I felt calm as I stood up.

The fact that the chain was bronze and the rings gold stayed in my mind as I slipped them over the clasp and down the length. “it doesn’t match” rang in my head and I scolded myself for being so ridiculous, this was not the time for such trivial things.

With rings clinking together now adorned around my neck, I sat on the edge of my futon bed and kept the internal dialogue a flow. Thoughts of his face, his voice, and his life brought tears to my eyes and strength to my heart.

I put the warm metal to my mouth and kissed them softly recalling moments where my dad and I really saw each other.

Those moments where two souls connect for seconds that feel like an eternity, the chaotic calmness of slow moving time, moments that don’t need words, moments where hearts are sharing.

I kissed the rings again, got up and looked in the mirror. I gazed at the woman in the glass and spoke out loud “look at me” and I did.

With tears rolling down my cheeks, standing in front of myself I knew for the first time in a long time that I was ok.

… an excerpt from the journal of kim cathers …